A 58-year-old deputy chief medical officer of health posted in Purulia who tested positive for Covid three weeks ago died on Sunday in Calcutta, the incident coming amid reports of several doctors, nurses and health staff, including the CMOH of Birbhum, testing positive.

Senior health officials said rising infections among health staff, doctors and other frontline workers are an urgent cause for concern at a time Covid infections in Bengal have crossed 6,000 and a massive healthcare infrastructure needs to be fighting fit to combat the pandemic.

“The death of a senior health official has prompted us to take measures to save frontline workers from infection. Though this new variant is not fatal like in the first two waves, handling a large number of infections among people in healthcare services will be a challenge. We are receiving information from hospitals about infected doctors, nurses and health staff,” said a official of health services in Calcutta.

“In a Calcutta hospital, around 70 medical personnel are infected with Covid. It will be challenging to provide treatment if such a situation comes about in rural or district hospitals,” he added.

Health officials said all hospitals have been asked to keep standby rosters to make up for shortfall if staff are infected.

Satya Narayan Chowdhury, the deputy CMOH-I of Purulia and resident of Hooghly’s Chinsurah, was found Covid positive three weeks ago and admitted to a private hospital in Calcutta. Three days ago, he was shifted to the Calcutta Medical College and Hospital where he breathed his last on Sunday morning.

On Sunday morning, the CMOH of Birbhum, Himadri Ari, was found positive with Covid and sent to home isolation. Sources said Ari is tolerably well so far and has only displayed mild symptoms.

At least 10 health officials, including a doctor from Hooghly, and at least half a dozen persons in health services from districts including East Burdwan, Bankura and Jhargram, reported positive on Friday. “We will face shortage of health officials, doctors and nurses if infection rates among health workers rise. It will be challengingto manage the situation if the staff are notprotected,” said an official in Birbhum.

Health officials in Purulia said deaths of several senior health officials had created a vacuum in the previous phases of the pandemic. “It is not just the case of a single official, but many others are also being infected. This is not a normal situation… Suddenly, we are busy preparing hospitals, isolation wards and other infrastructure to handle a large number of patients,” said a health official in Purulia.

After chief secretary H.K. Dwivedi announced new curb effective from Monday, police in most South Bengal districts cracked down on people violating protocol. “We started legal action against 67 people who violated Covid norms by not wearing masks or crowding. Action will be stricter from Monday,” said Dhritiman Sarkar, the district police chief of Bankura.

In Birbhum, detention or legal action was taken against over 300 people on Sunday.